Chapter 136
The workers at Kakum National Park didn't eat lunch until they finished their morning work.
Their rule was that they ate lunch only after everyone had done their assigned job.
After applying medicine to the injured elephants, mixing medicine with hay and feeding it to them, and cleaning the elephant pen, Soo-hyun returned to the warehouse and met Jaehee and Abna, who had arrived early and were waiting for him.
Jaehee said with an unusually excited expression.
"Soo-hyun! What did you do?"
"Oh, I put medicine on the sick elephants. What about you?"
"Wow! I fed the baby elephants! They were so cute!"
"Really? That must have been adorable."
"Look at this, it's this big. I didn't know it was that small. Do you know how pretty and lovely it is? It looks like it's smiling!"
"Haha, I see."
Abna just smiled, as if she had come here many times to help her father with his work. Soo-hyun asked, looking around.
"What about Junwoo?"
At that moment, Junwoo, wearing overalls and boots, entered with his shoulders slumped and holding a shovel covered in dung. Jaehee covered her nose and frowned.
"Ugh, it stinks!"
Junwoo threw down the shovel and lay on the floor. He seemed to be wearing work clothes and not his own.
"Phew, it seems like the smell of poop won't leave my body… I guess I eat so much that I poop as much as I eat. Hehe."
Junwoo lay down, held out his hand to Soo-hyun, and spoke desperately.
"My friend Soo-hyun… Please take my shift this afternoon…"
"Haha, I understand."
Junwoo, who was dying, suddenly jumped up.
"Really? What do you do?"
"Taking care of a sick elephant."
"Ah! That's the fun of living in Africa! Is it a real exchange?"
"Well."
"Ha, you really are my friend."
Junwoo, who saw his friends looking fine, unlike him who came back completely exhausted, asked Jaehee.
"What did you do?"
"Give milk to the baby elephant."
Junwoo reflexively looked at Jaehee's chest. At first, Jaehee didn't know why his gaze was moving, but her face became fierce and she covered her chest.
"Where are you looking?"
Abna clapped her hands and laughed.
"Hahahaha, ahahahahaha!!!"
Junwoo's face turned red and he started talking nonsense as he thought of something.
"No, that's not it. It was just a stream of consciousness that moved my gaze. No, I wasn't thinking anything strange! Did I really think you were feeding babies…? Ah, that's not it! Anyway, that's not it!"
Soo-hyun, who belatedly realized what Junwoo was thinking, burst out laughing. Inside the warehouse, Ignacio prepared lunch for his friends.
"Okay, let's have lunch."
Junwoo quickly took off his work clothes and ran.
"Wow! I was so hungry I almost died! What kind of food is this?"
"Banku is a type of bread made from fermented cornmeal and cassava. I prepared bread because I thought you wouldn't like the food we usually eat. I also brought jam, so eat it with milk."
"Thank you, sir!!"
Junwoo stuffed himself with bread because he was so hungry. In contrast, Soo-hyun ate the bread slowly, like Jaehee or Abna. Ignacio and his colleagues were eating the same bread on one side. The colleagues who were chatting among themselves looked at Soo-hyun at some point.
When his colleagues nudged him in the ribs, Ignacio stood up as if he couldn't help it, approached him, and said,
"Soo-hyun is over there."
Soo-hyun stood up after quickly chewing all the bread he was eating.
"Yes, sir."
"Oh, sorry to interrupt your meal."
"No."
"I heard from Javari that you play the piano."
"Yes, sir."
Junwoo raised his hand and spoke.
"Oh, m-m-me-me-me! (I play the piano too!)"
Junwoo's words, which were slurred because he was biting down on his mouthful of bread, did not attract anyone's attention. Ignacio said, looking at Abna's expression as if it were a difficult request.
"Excuse me… I know it's very rude of me to ask, but… if you're okay with it, could you play a song for the elephants?"
Abna shouted in surprise.
"Dad!"
'It would be very rude to ask an art student to draw a picture or ask a music student to play a musical instrument.'
Soo-hyun raised his hand to stop Abna and said.
"I already told Mr. Javari that I would play a role earlier."
Ignacio scratched his head as if he had already heard that beforehand.
"I'm sorry to ask you this. I know it's rude, but our elephants really enjoyed it a few years ago. Of course, they're not the same children as before, but I thought they would react similarly."
Soo-hyun smiled brightly. He knew that despite his rudeness, they had asked for this favor for the sake of the elephants. Soo-hyun said, holding up the bread.
"I'll eat this."
"No, no. You can eat slowly and do it. The afternoon schedule is not very tight."
"Yes, sir."
When Ignacio turned and looked at his daughter, Abna sighed and said.
"I'm sorry, Soo-hyun."
Soo-hyun said as he sat down.
"What?"
"I made you play. You're not the type to play in a place like this."
Soo-hyun said with a smile.
"What kind of pianist plays in a place like this?"
"That…"
"I heard there was a pianist who played here in 2016. Do you know him?"
Abna nodded.
"Yes, I haven't seen him because I'm studying abroad, but I heard about him from my father."
"Do you know who the person who played in 'that kind of place' you mentioned is?" Soo-hyun asked with a wink.
"Huh? Who are you?"
"Professor Lech Piłsudski."
Junwoo and Jaehee shouted in shock.
"Professor Lech from Warsaw, Poland?"
Abna also had a perplexed look on her face, knowing Lech's reputation.
"P-Professor Lech came to my dad's work and gave a concert…?"
Soo-hyun said with his characteristic eye-smile.
"This is where Professor Lech played for the elephants. Isn't it lucky to be able to play here?"
Silence fell. No one answered, but the atmosphere became one of acknowledgment.
'I think Professor Lech is a truly respectable professor.'
The respect he felt for the elephant deepened even more when he thought that someone so famous would come all this way with a piano to play for the elephant. At that moment, Junwoo leaned over to Soo-hyun and broke the atmosphere.
"Don't you need a premiere performance?"
Thanks to Junwoo, laughter erupted and the atmosphere brightened up again.
On the Cloud Bridge in Kakum National Park.
About thirty people were crossing the bridge, each of them carrying heavy-looking equipment on their shoulders.
"Hey, go a little faster. It's heavy."
"Hey, wait a minute. I came to take pictures, so I have to include one."
The language they were using to converse was English. They didn't seem to be Ghanaian. They were a mix of white and black people.
"This is the seventh time I've come to Africa, but I can't get used to this weather," a white man with sweat running down his face said.
The black man next to me said with a smile,
"But this time, we can at least cover the production costs, right? Our company produced another hit drama, right?"
"Yes, thanks to that, the budget has become a little more generous."
"Haha, documentaries are basically budget-eating programs."
"Haha, that's right. Ah, did you get the cheetah's location?"
"Yes, the local guide who set off first is chasing them. They're constantly moving, so it's hard to capture them on screen."
"That's right. It's even worse because there were 200,000 ten years ago, but now there are only 7,000 left."
"But the guide said the guy he found was carrying three cubs."
"Oh! Great. How many months old do you think the baby is?"
"I think it's been about a month."
"He must be shedding. It'll be a beautiful picture."
Then the truck jerked and made a loud noise. A white man shouted, holding the equipment piled up inside to prevent it from falling.
"What's wrong?"
The staff member riding in the passenger seat shouted.
"PD! It's so hot outside that I think my car has a problem! It's hard to move right now."
"Damn it, how many more hours will it take?"
"It has to be over four."
"Tch, I guess I can't help it. Isn't there anywhere to rest here?"
"They say there's an elephant sanctuary about a kilometer away. You can rest there."
"Okay, let's go there first. Damn it! If I get a few elephant drawings, I can get at least a minute's worth of footage. I hate wasting time."
"Yes, PD!"
The group arrived in front of the elephant sanctuary in a few minutes.
"I don't know if I'll use it, but let's take some pictures. This is a shelter for injured or herd-out elephants, so I might be able to get some pictures that touch the heart," the PD said.
As the PD gave instructions, the staff moved nimbly. The sound team staff tilted their heads as they put on their headphones. He took off his headphones and looked around as he spoke.
"Is anyone playing music? I'm bothered by the sound. Could you please turn it off?"
The sound staff shouted, but the working staff just stared at each other blankly. After making sure that no one was playing music, the staff member listened again with his keen hearing. The PD came and asked.
"You weren't playing music at the shelter, were you?"
"Just a moment."
The sound staff member, who had been listening to the amplified sound through his headphones after pricking up his ears, took off his headphones and said.
"That's strange."
"What?"
"This isn't recorded music."
"Hmm?"
"Listen."
The PD, wearing a headset held by the staff, heard the sound of a piano.
"Who's playing the piano if it's not recorded music?"
The PD quickly shouted when a good picture flashed through his mind.
"Camera team! Go in quickly! We have to record before the performance is over! Sound team, you go in quickly too and record with sync sound!"
The staff rushed into the shelter. The PD, who had been guarding the shelter for a while, also ran into the shelter at a brisk pace. On his back, the logo of the broadcasting station, wearing a vest similar to the staff's, could be seen.
American number one channel, HUO.
HUO, an American broadcasting company, had offered Soo-hyun the soundtrack for season 9 of Emperor's Game. The link to that place was slowly being rekindled.